Meredith Music Festival
Meredith Supernatural Amphitheatre
December 10-12, 2010
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Meredith is indeed a special festival, a kind of haven away from the city and all life’s complications. You won’t see any corporate signage (there is none), you won’t miss any bands (there is only one stage) and you won’t line up to pay exuberant prices for drinks, because you can bring your own, it’s crazy, right?
And the Meredithians who attend are a special breed – cheerful, happy and devoted people all there with a common goal, which can loosely be described as having the no. 1 weekend of the year. Once tickets are luckily attained – a complicated ballot system is in place to allocate the much sought after passes – many spend months planning and preparing everything they need for the ultimate festival experience. Of course once we arrive and set up camp most of these plans are abandoned as we are caught up in it all and end up wearing the same clothes for the whole weekend and miss some of the bands as we get deeply involved in amusing campsite shenanigans, but we still have a glorious weekend that will be talked about all year, until the next one.
The gang of scallywags I travelled with were particularly keen this year and we were driving out of the city sometime around 2am, a worrying start to what is destined to be a sleepless weekend. By about 4am we joined the line in the cold country night, crammed into the overfull car we waited it out for hours with only the knowledge of the good times ahead to keep us sane. We made it in as the morning was warming up and found ourselves in a well-deserved campsite among the trees in the heavily sought after bush camp. Now we’re here and set up, with the first band still six hours away, what do we do? Well, friends, I guess we drink.
Friday
What better fashion to kick off the festival with the stomping fun of the Puta Madre Brothers. Each one of these gents has a bass drum in front of them to accompany their guitars, making them “the worlds only one man band band.”
When I spoke to Rat Vs Possum earlier in the year they talked enthusiastically about how playing Meredith was one of their ultimate goals and it was a joy to watch these kids live out a dream up on that stage. They let it all out as they played extended and altered versions of tracks off their debut disc Daughter Of Sunshine – the tune ‘Pills’ was an absolute highlight – as well as some new stuff.
A quick drinks break back at the tent ended up being a longer one and consequently Kimbra and Jeff The Brotherhood were unfortunately missed.
Broadcast were probably playing at the wrong time. Their experimental electro sounds mixed with 60s-influenced vocals are best set against a backdrop of psychedelic lights shooting out into the dark of night, not the fading evening light in front of a crowd looking, at this stage, for a bit of boogie. It felt like they were at times on the verge of winning the crowd over but unfortunately just never really got there.
Cloud Control took to the stage just after dark. Some people were saying that this was an odd spot for them, that they would be better suited to an afternoon slot, where their chilled out tunes and sweet melodies would work best. Mostly it was I saying these things, but after watching them play, I was duly encouraged to eat my hat. These guys really rocked out. It’s amazing how a little distorted guitar and some well performed stage antics can turn a folky song into a good-times, foot-stomping dancing song. Their cover of Kid Cudi’s ‘Pursuit Of Happiness’ also went down a treat.
I missed Reverend Horton Heat too but later on had a long conversation with a stranger who informed me that they were excellent. So, you know, I guess they were excellent.
Little Red have had an amazing half-year or so since the release of mega-hit single ‘Rock It’ (supposedly written about Meredith) and excellent album Midnight Remember. The crowd in front of stage was big and bursting with excitement, expectations were high and they pulled it off, mostly. A few songs fell a little flat; the lo-fi charm of the first album didn’t quite sit right with the more grandiose second album numbers. But they worked it hard and everyone was in the mood to party so we had a great time.
It all gets a little murky in the ol’ memory box from here on in. Clipse had the amphitheatre jumping for 45 minutes – or possibly less, I think they finished early – and those of us not usually into their particular brand of hip hop got into the spirit. It was at some point through The Field’s consciousness expanding sonic performance that I made my way back to camp, the end of a long day but only the beginning of a long weekend.
Saturday
As I lay awake on Saturday morning with the sun slowly warming my tent and suggesting I get up, forget about the hangover, get an egg and bacon sandwich from the community tucker tent and carry on where last night left off, it was KYU that gave me the soundtrack I needed.
So it had been raining in bits and pieces so far, nothing too serious, but as Washed Out were setting up, the clouds gathered ominously. How ironic, we groaned, it’s going to piss down as a band called Washed Out begin to play. But what’s the opposite of irony? Because as they came on stage the sun broke through the clouds and lit up the amphitheatre gloriously. Unfortunately this only lasted a song or two and the clouds came over again. I guess my extended discussion of the weather is a fairly obvious pointer to the fact that there were more interesting things going on through this time slot than the band on stage.
If you’ve been to a festival in the last four or five years then mostly likely you have seen CW Stoneking play, this guy really seems to get around. His appeal is a little lost on me, I have to say, but he certainly received a rapturous response from the large crowd there to see him and his band.
One of the wonderful things about Meredith is that you don’t need to get in front of stage three bands before the one you want to see just to get a good spot, you simply walk in after the last band play and there you are, right up in front of stage. Which is exactly where I was standing in anticipation for one of my present favorite bands, Girls. The stage was adorned with flowers, which sweetly complemented the beautifully melancholy pop tunes about heartbreak and looking for love that made up the solid set from this Californian band. Lead singer Chris Owens looked a little shy on stage and there wasn’t much movement from the rest of the band, but the music did the talking. Great.
Ah… 3.20pm, I guess it’s about time to start pumping up for the evening, who might help us with this, I wonder? I believe El Guincho might be able to do it better than anyone else I know. The boys from Barcelona delivered a perfect set of deliciously danceable pop tunes and found themselves the deserved recipients of the shoe (its tradition at Meredith that if you really like a performance, than you take off your shoe and hold it in the air).
Legendary post punk British group The Fall, fronted by super-grump Mark E. Smith, made a lot of noise and showed why they remain popular after 30-plus-years (though Smith is the only original member). A typical song structure for this lot sort of goes; big break-stuff drums, triple dirty guitar and then grumble, grumble, grumble from Mr smiley on vocals. It doesn’t really sound that good but I promise it is.
Custard provided exactly what we expected and what we wanted – mid-nineties party tunes. We jumped about and let our younger selves out. It was just what the afternoon called for, and the festival highlight for some, particularly the loon next to me who drank three cans in about 7 seconds.
Don’t really remember what happened here, sorry. Maybe beers?
Anyway, wherever we went, we made it back to the stage just in time to see Neil Finn deliver the festival defining performance. Meredith came out in full to witness the legendary songsmith perform. It’s amazing what one man can do with a guitar, he manipulated it to create moments of heartbreaking intimacy punctuated by sharp injections of crunchy distortion to keep us constantly on edge, constantly mesmerized. Just as it was all getting too much and the weeping crowd (seriously) could take no more, Finn pulled up a member of the front row for guitar accompaniment and some light hearted fun. The evenings second guest sent a ripple of mad joy through the crowd. “I’d like to bring on a friend”, Finn declared, and moments later the unmistakable violin-clutching and gloriously bearded figure of Warren Ellis from Dirty Three sauntered on stage and punched the air. Ellis added violin to ‘Don’t Dream It’s Over’ and together the two men created the perfect moment of the perfect set of the perfect festival.
Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings had a particularly tough act to follow, not helped by the fact that the first serious downpour of rain started right around the time of their set, but they danced and they grooved and so did we.
The organizers had been promising that the Light Show would be something special and, as usual, they didn’t get it wrong. Some of the more substance addled of those among us probably thought their mind was exploding, especially when the UFO came out. Right, that’s enough; I’m going to bed.
Sunday
A Meredith institution, Master Song Tai Chi, kicks off Sunday morning and the crowd assembled is a combination of enthusiastic early risers, the hungover masses in need of a cure and a collection of punters still up from the night before, looking confused and perhaps only still around because they’ve forgotten which direction there camp is and must wait for a friend to gently guide them home. I got my second bacon and egg sandwich at this point and it was really, really good.
Sally Seltman made everyone feel warm and good with her sunny tunes, particularly with the song “everyone’s getting married to”, ‘Harmony To My Heartbeat’. Those Darlins entertained us with their country rock and charmed us with their words, “I want to suck all your dicks!”
A late surprise came from Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, who are, well, I guess you would say they are an ensemble of brass players (and a drummer) who play hypnotic tunes. They are also all brothers, all eight of them. They really got the crowd into it, employing all the tricks – getting a call and response going with the audience and making us crouch down and back up when the groove kicks in. The dancing they created was no easy feat considering what we’ve been through for the last two nights. It would have been interesting to see how they would have gone down on the Saturday night…anyway it was brilliant.
Is there a more appropriate way to finish off three days of sweaty, muddy fun than watching people run headlong through that mud and sweat in a mission to procure a hat off a stuffed animal while completely naked – an event known as The Meredith Gift? Probably not.
Well.
It was a big weekend.
The music was first–class, the weather was, usually, fine but most of all it was the people that made it the special little thing that it was.
It’s also amazing to think we drank all that booze, not one drop left behind, although plenty of brain fragments were, along with the poles of that gazebo that just never got up.
How many stars for you, 20th Meredith Music Festival? Fucking five.
